


Summer's Turns

by Trobadora



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/F, Fantasy, Mages, Magic, Magic School, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-22
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-06-09 23:58:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15279078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trobadora/pseuds/Trobadora
Summary: Inzun was not a fellow student mage any more. She was a student death-witch instead, even if her teachers hoped she would never actually use those powers.





	Summer's Turns

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ariestess](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariestess/gifts).



The assembly bell had never rung out of turn before. It rang once every week at the end of the free-day, calling the students back to the hall, and never otherwise - not once in the four years Kersa had been a student mage at Blackwood Tower. It was ringing now, calling in deep, resonant tones out across the plateau, ringing over the lake, echoing back from the mountains above.

Kersa stood up from the wooden dock she'd sat on to practice water-patterns, looking around. It was a bright early-summer day, the clouds above carrying no rain. No one had come up the winding road to Blackwood's high plateau, or down from the higher pastures above. Both paths led directly to the lake, and she could not have missed a visitor who might have brought important news. The only person in sight was one of the men from the farm supporting the school at the Tower. He was out fixing a fence, and Kersa watched him turn to look back to the high tower and its abutting buildings, but the bell was not for him.

If some magical accident had happened, surely it would have been the fire-bell that rang instead.

Curiosity and worry mixed in Kersa's stomach and quickened her step, and her awareness of the many small living things in the lake's cold, deep water faded away quickly. 

The tables and chairs had been pushed to the walls in the main hall, and some of the girls were already standing in the middle, talking in low murmurs. It was assembly-place and refectory in one, but only for serious ceremonies were the tables ever removed.

The five younger girls and four of the older ones had been inside the building, and quicker to turn up. Five more trickled in from various parts, until only one was missing. They all looked at each other uncomfortably. 

"Where are the teachers?" fifteen-year-old Allir, one of the youngest, whispered to her neighbour, who was no older. 

When the Mistresses came, it was all four of them at once, stern and angry expressions on their faces. Mistress Perrye was dragging an ashen-faced girl along by the arm. Inzun, the missing student, with strands of brown hair escaping from her ponytail.

Mousy Inzun, who'd been nicknamed "the dullard" when she'd first arrived, shortly after Kersa. Who'd never done anything to shake the moniker.

Mistress Perrye pulled Inzun after her to the front of the room and put her free hand on her hip, glaring at everyone. She always looked strict with her black hair in its firm bun, but Kersa had never seen her this furious before, not even when Allir had talked one of the older students into bringing the teachers' feather-beds to life, and Mistress Perrye had ended up covered in bird droppings. The other Mistresses looked just as grim. 

"You have been called here to witness," Perrye said, dark anger colouring her voice. "Be told, students of Blackwood Tower, that Inzun, who was one of your number, broke faith and oath."

The words struck like a thunderclap against Kersa's eardrums, resonating through her body with the heaviness of the magic they carried. This was a judgment.

Around her, Kersa could see and feel the shock hit everyone. All the girls were staring wide-eyed at Inzun and Perrye, dread settling over them. Inzun had broken her oath? And despite her grey face, she simply stood there, looking neither defiant nor contrite, face pinched more in focus than in fear.

Inzun had plenty to be afraid of. Since the end of the last mage-war, studying magic required severe oaths, and no student mage was allowed out on their own until they'd studied for ten full years. _I shall not seek power, or pursue forbidden knowledge. I shall not cast in the service of others, nor use magic without invitation ..._ They were principles meant to prevent the horrors of the mage-wars, and any mage would turn instantly against one who broke it.

Mistress Arvath, the library-keeper, who continued. "Inzun has broken into the Tower's library, and was found among the books of power, stealing for herself the knowledge of magic too powerful to be allowed outside."

Kersa stared. Inzun? Dullard Inzun, unremarkable in every way? How had she even managed such a feat?

"What is the punishment for a faithless mage?" Mistress Perrye asked, her gaze sweeping over the assembled students. It burned in Kersa's mind, and she swallowed. None of them spoke. "You know this, as Inzun did. You, Allir. Speak."

Allir, a short, round-faced girl who'd only been at Blackwood for a year and already had made a reputation for herself as a troublemaker, slowly took a step forward and swallowed visibly. "Death, or the Turning, Mistress Perrye," she croaked.

"Yes," said Mistress Perrye, heavily. She turned towards Inzun, whose wrist she was still gripping. "There can be no mercy. What you have taken is too much, for you might use it. You must never again be able to draw on the powers of life. Death is yours now. But you are yet young. We shall turn your magic, so it will curdle milk and wither crops, and be of no further use to you. You will be a death-witch, unwelcome everywhere."

Even to this, Inzun did not visibly react. There was an air of focus around her, as if she had pulled herself together so firmly, no emotion could leak out.

"This is not a punishment we administer lightly," said Mistress Arvath. "Witness it, students."

Mistress Perrye let go of Inzun's arm, even as all the teachers gathered around the girl, palms outstretched. It rippled through the room, and for a long, drawn-out moment there was a buzz in the air as from a nest of wasps. When it faded, a smell of decay hung in the air, and it took Kersa a moment to realise it wasn't a true smell. It was Inzun's Turned magic that she could sense, a malignant thing that dimmed the powers of life around her and leaked out into the air. 

Kersa stared, horrified. She'd witnessed the creation of a death-witch. Inzun looked back at her - at all of them, of course, but Kersa still flinched from the brief meeting of eyes. Inzun hadn't said a single word the entire time.

~*~

Kersa had thought Inzun would be sent away from Blackwood Tower immediately, but instead, she was forced to stay - under strict oversight, and always locked into her room at night.

"She must be taught," Mistress Perrye explained, her face pinched. "We will make certain she can control her Turned magic before she leaves this place. If she holds it in and never uses it, she may yet live a fruitful life. If she does not ..." She shook her head, and it seemed resignation as much as anger when she continued, "People will not abide a death-witch. Should she use that vileness deliberately, she will be hunted. Let us hope she knows better than that."

Inzun crossed her arms, listening attentively. She seemed bizarrely unafraid, still with that strange concentration about her.

~*~

Kersa didn't see much of Inzun in the following weeks. Of course not: Inzun was not a fellow student mage any more, after all. She was a student death-witch instead, even if her teachers hoped she would never actually use those powers. But she still had to study to master them, so she could rein them in.

Most of the day, Inzun was kept firmly away from everyone, Mistress Perrye overseeing her directly. She was not present during lessons, or group practice. But she was there at meal-times, sitting at the other end of the table. The student-table in the hall seated twenty-five, for only sixteen girls, so there were always empty chairs between Inzun and the rest of them. Kersa was glad of it.

There were murmurs, of course. Inzun's name was in everyone's mouth, her Turned magic made responsible for every ill, from the rotting disease in the vegetable garden to the broken plank on the lake-dock, from a twisted ankle to the time Mistress Arvath got caught in a summer-night thunderstorm and caught a cold. No one but the teachers knew what was truly Inzun's fault, and they never commented. 

She was there in the reading-room, too, sometimes. Mistress Arvath had assigned her special reading, accounts of the fates of death-witches who did not rein in their powers. Gruesome stuff. They'd already read some of it in other contexts. Now, the books Inzun had to read were a constant reminder of who - what - was living in their midst, reinforced by the malignant feel of Inzun's magic, which only dimmed with time as she learned to hold it in.

It was only for chores at the farm, which the student mages were obliged to perform in payment for the food and the services the farmers provided, that Inzun still interacted with the rest of them. Everyone kept their distance as best they could.

Oath-breaker. Death-witch. Kersa wasn't sure which was more terrifying.

Still, Kersa had never really noticed Inzun before, and now she found her attention drawn all the time. During meals, or chores, or catching a glimpse from an upper window, seeing Inzun practice patterns in one of the inner courtyards. They were like no patterns Kersa had seen, all turned and twisted from what was familiar. 

Inzun had always been the dullard in the background, speaking little even though no one had mocked her moorland accent in years. She'd been mousy and unremarkable, but now, she always seemed focused, pulled tight and standing straight. Perhaps it was her Turned magic; perhaps it was only Kersa's horror that made Inzun seem more than she was. 

Kersa looked down from the second-storey window, her stomach in knots, knowing she shouldn't be watching, yet fascinated against her will. The ivy on one of the walls had withered, and Mistress Perrye was standing before Inzun, hands on her hips, chastising her. Inzun was listening attentively, tucking a strand of her hair behind an ear.

She'd never listened to lessons like that before. She'd always faded into the background. Perhaps she had to, now; perhaps the severity of what she'd done, and what had been done to her, had finally forced her into focus.

~*~

"But how did she even get into the library?" Allir asked again as they were walking down towards the farmhouse. "That part of the Tower has a million wards and protections. We've all seen them when we were taken inside! It takes an hour just to walk through the maze-wards, and that's not even the inner sanctum."

The mystery had remained with them, inciting constant speculation. And it was a good question, Kersa thought. If she wanted to break into the library, she wouldn't know how to even begin. So how had Inzun done it? Rumours abounded. She'd turned into a spider and crawled through the walls; she'd stolen Mistress Arvath's clothes and had forced the former life in the wool to make a thread that led her through the maze; she'd sold half her life-force to a vengeful ghost. All of them were sensational and thrilling, and none of them made much sense.

Inzun must have heard at least some of them, but she never said anything herself. She didn't talk much at all. But when Lirra, in hushed tones, suggested she might have summoned a demon, she finally threw up her hands. 

"There's a shortcut!" Inzun said loudly, exasperated. Making sure everyone heard her, though she never walked too close to them. Had she grown, these last few weeks, or was she standing straighter? She looked impressive now. Imposing. "Of course there is. Do you really think Mistress Arvath wants to take a full hour just to get into her own library? I knew there had to be a way to cut through all those tedious protections. It was just a matter of finding it."

They all stared. _Just._ A broken oath, and even now Inzun didn't show any outward sign of guilt or regret. Though with that focus she had nowadays, perhaps it was simply that nothing leaked out.

It was Kersa who finally asked, reluctantly fascinated, "How did you ...?" 

"Easy. I just had to pick a day when I knew she was going to go to the library. And then I used a tracking-moth." Inzun rolled her shoulders uncomfortably, and looked away, but didn't duck her head as she might have once.

Kersa flinched. Of course - it was a spell Inzun would never be able to use again. She'd never been a brilliant mage, but she'd been good at the small things, the insect-spells, the patterns requiring fine control. And now if she tried, the moth would simply die.

Effective punishment, indeed. _Death-witch._

~*~

Kersa had never minded chores at the farm. They were an opportunity to show off what magic she'd learned: encouraging crops to grow, easing the harvest, casting protections against vermin.

Inzun, of course, could do none of those things any more. Instead, the farmer told her to go fork hay in the barn, not once meeting her eyes. He spat on the ground in front of Inzun, then walked away.

She deserved it, no doubt. Oath-breaker. It was awful to watch, all the same, even if Inzun simply picked up the hay-fork and went to work. 

They were alone in the barn now, just Inzun and her, Inzun forking hay and Kersa drawing patterns with her fingers over the wood of the barn to renew the mouse-wards. 

Inzun's presence seemed to be burning behind her back, though the sense of decay no longer hung quite so palpably around her. Kersa itched to test it, to reach with magical senses for the air around Inzun, to see what still leaked from her now. 

_No._ Better not test a death-witch's control. If Inzun lashed out with her Turned magic in return and their opposed powers tangled, the backlash would be awful. For both of them.

But if she couldn't test her with magic, she had to at least see. When Kersa looked over her shoulder, Inzun was hard at work with the hay-fork, too-big working gloves on her hands and a determined expression on her face. There was colour on her cheeks, and she'd dropped her robes, working in shorts and undershirt, her breasts moving with her heavy breath.

Inzun's head came up, catching Kersa's look, and she put the hay-fork down, drawing herself up straight. Kersa flinched, returning quickly to her task.

~*~

"The girl isn't bothering you, is she?" Mistress Perrye asked, gruffly, at the end of another instruction session by the lake, the slow wind coming across the water pulling at a strand of hair escaped from her bun.

Kersa's eyes went wide. "N-no," she stuttered. There was no question who Perrye was talking about. Inzun was about nineteen, Kersa's own age, but she was always _the girl_ to the teachers now. "I don't - is something wrong, Mistress Perrye? Did I do something?"

Mistress Perrye shook her head. "No, of course not, Kersa. Never you mind. You're a good student." And she turned away, towards the Tower.

Her heart hammering, heat creeping into her cheeks, Kersa looked after her, the too-bright sun suddenly painful on her skin. A few weeks ago, hearing Mistress Perrye call her a good student would have meant a great deal to her. Now it tasted sour, like spoiled milk.

~*~

Kersa crept up to the open window again. Down in the small courtyard, Inzun still practiced every day, sometimes with a teacher, sometimes on her own. She was alone today, and wasn't drawing patterns. Instead, she was standing at a wall, running her fingers over brown dead ivy, the vines she had killed.

Kersa shivered. She knew what dead plants felt like to her: the echo of life, still clinging on as a memory. She wondered what they felt like to a death-witch.

Inzun was a mystery, and Kersa couldn't stop thinking of her. Why had she broken her oath? What had she wanted with those mysteries from the library? She didn't seem like someone who'd selfishly reached for power and been thwarted. 

And why did she feel so much more present, vividly and inescapably _there_ , when she never had before - when in truth it was death that clung to her now?

Below, Inzun turned away from the dead vines to the living ones beside them, and when her hand ran over bright green leaves, Kersa sucked in a sharp breath. The vine did not wither. Inzun had clearly learned well how to rein in the decay her Turned magic brought. 

Kersa couldn't look away. That deadly touch, not damaging the life it held -

Inzun suddenly looked up, straight towards Kersa's window. What had drawn Inzun's attention? Some death-witch sense Kersa didn't know?

Kersa felt frozen in place as they stared at each other, two storeys apart. She swallowed, her mouth suddenly very dry, and stepped back into the corridor, hiding from Inzun's eyes.

~*~

Kersa pulled herself out of the icy lake-water and onto the dock, enjoying the hot sun on her skin for a few moments even as the water drained from her body and her hair, the magical connection she'd been practicing draining away with it. Soon she'd be able to remain under water for more than just ten minutes. Mistress Perrye herself had said there was no doubt now that water was Kersa's strength, and practicing it was fun. But there were other parts of her studies she mustn't neglect.

With a sigh, she drew herself up and let her magic drive the water from her until she was completely dry, then wrapped her robe around herself and made for the Tower.

By the time she reached its shade, the coolness from the lake water was gone from her skin, no longer keeping her from feeling the oppressively humid heat of the day. She was glad to duck into the reading room, whose air was spellbound to remain cool and dry.

Kersa went for the book she'd been working her way through, an old text Mistress Arvath had brought her, written by a lakewalker in days gone by. "You have an affinity," Arvath had said. "You will find more in it than in the more common texts meant for other mages' benefit."

It was only after she'd opened the book to the page she'd last stopped and pulled out a sheet of paper and a pencil to make notes that she realised she was not alone. Inzun was sitting in a corner, a book on the desk before her, glaring at her. Kersa ducked her head, and focused on her work.

Mistress Arvath had been right - so many of the author's descriptions would have sounded like fanciful metaphors, had she not had that sense of water that had grown stronger in her over the last year. It was a fascinating book, and yet today, it did not hold her attention. Every other paragraph, she found herself looking up, found her eyes going to Inzun's corner.

Again, now. But this time, Inzun was staring right back. "Is there a problem?" she said, flatly.

Kersa flushed. "Sorry," she muttered. She tried to focus on her book, but made no real progress on her reading, too aware of Inzun's presence, of Inzun's gaze.

~*~

The sun had set, and Kersa was preparing for bed, walking absent-mindedly down the corridor towards the bathroom. The grip on her wrist came out of nowhere.

She was spun around, slammed into the wall. A forearm braced across her throat. Inzun's green eyes were glaring at her. "What are you doing?" she growled, the R rolling, her moorland accent more prominent than usual.

Kersa had been reaching for some magical defence; now she flinched back. She couldn't use magic to attack a death-witch. "I wasn't doing anything," she snapped back. "What do you think _you_ are doing?"

Inzun pulled away, her spine straightening as she crossed her arms over her chest. Her brown hair was open. She, too, must have prepared for bed. "You've been spying on me for some time," she said, matter-of-fact. "Back at the farm. Down in the courtyard. In the reading-room. Even at mealtimes, you stare at me. What do you think you'll find? What do you think you can see, that the Mistresses don't?"

"What?" Kersa blinked, taken aback. "I wasn't spying!"

"Yes, you were." Inzun didn't seem angry, merely intent. Focused. _Focused on Kersa._

"I wasn't staring."

"Yes, you were. Do you think I'm blind?" 

Kersa stared at her - yes - for too long, unable to look away, unable to come up with an answer. What _did_ she want? Inzun had broken her oath; she was a death-witch; she was someone any sane person should avoid. Why couldn't Kersa look away? 

Inzun was getting impatient. "Well?"

Kersa hesitated for another moment under Inzun's intense eyes, then, desperately, leaned forward and brushed her lips against Inzun's.

Inzun flinched back as if struck. Her mouth opened. Her focus faltered, and she looked dazed. "You're mad," she whispered, but she was already reeling Kersa in, pulling their bodies together, taking possession of her mouth.

It lasted too short a while; then Inzun tore herself away. "I need to be in my room before the hour-bell," she said, still looking stunned, running a hand through her hair. Of course: someone always came to lock her in at night, and would notice if she wasn't there.

"Right," Kersa said, faintly. 

"Right," Inzun repeated, already moving down the corridor, but backwards, as if she couldn't bring herself to turn away.

Kersa stared after her for a long time, trying to wrap her mind around what had just happened. What she'd just done.

~*~

She lay awake that night, turning from side to side in her bed, the breeze from the open window shivering over gooseflesh. She'd kissed Inzun. Inzun had kissed her.

An oath-breaker. A death-witch. And she'd kissed her.

The memory of Inzun's eyes drilled into her. Inzun's lips on hers - Inzun's body pressed against hers -

Her fingers slipped between her thighs, and she hissed, her hips shifting. She shouldn't. She couldn't stop. Knuckles pressing against herself, she whimpered with sudden need. Did it really matter? Inzun was learning how to rein herself in; she would be made to leave soon. 

Kersa stroked herself frantically, moaning with startled pleasure as thoughts of Inzun filled her mind.

~*~

_Do not look at Inzun. Do not think of Inzun._

She lasted almost a week, avoiding her. But Inzun's presence burned against Kersa's skin, and the memory of Inzun's kiss overwhelmed her anew, every day.

Finally Kersa gave in. Inzun would be gone soon. _Now, or never._

Now it was. Late at night, Kersa sneaked out of her own bedroom and into the room next to Inzun's, then climbed out of the window and balanced on the window ledge. She stepped out, inching along the wall, making the air support her as she went. No one but a mage could have done it; Inzun could not have got out that way. But Kersa could get in. She knocked on Inzun's window, until Inzun, clearly startled, opened it for her. 

Inzun's eyes glittered in the dim light. She stood frozen for a moment, then pulled Kersa inside, and into a kiss. Kersa had done it. She was inside Inzun's room. She was kissing Inzun, holding Inzun's face between her hands, devouring. Being devoured.

"Oh," Kersa breathed, breathless, when they had to come up for air.

"You really are out of your mind," Inzun murmured, not at all disapproving. "If someone catches you -"

"They'd have to be listening at the door."

Inzun laughed, and it made her look lighter. Kersa realised with a pang that she hadn't seen a genuine laugh on her since long before the Turning. When she'd first come here, maybe. But not for a very long time.

They stood, holding each other, taking kisses again and again.

"Why?" Inzun asked eventually. "You know what I am."

"Because," Kersa said helplessly. Why? Because Inzun was clever and intense and focused. Because she was a mystery. Because whatever she was, it was drawing Kersa like a flame. "Just because."

And death-witch or no, she'd destroyed nothing but her own future.

"Are you sure?"

"Shut up," Kersa demanded, pulling Inzun into another kiss, steering her towards the bed. "Just shut up."

Inzun's hands on her, Inzun's mouth. On her shoulders, on her breasts, between her thighs. Inzun's skin on hers. Kersa's hands dug into Inzun's shoulders, into her hair. Thighs interlocking. They moved together, bodies only. No need to say it: magic, between them, would be dangerous. They had to hold it in.

But that only made it better. No magical senses, so every touch was a surprise to Kersa. Every way they fit together was a new and unexpected delight. Every pleasure was that much more overwhelming.

It was difficult to stop, to tear herself away, to sneak back out. Kersa managed it, just before it got light outside, but Inzun's touch kept burning on her skin, shivering over her, and she shuddered with it as she crawled into her own bed and pushed fingers inside, as another wave of release rolled over her.

It had been better, under Inzun's hands.

~*~

She sneaked back the next night. And four days later. And again, and again, and again. They never talked much. Inzun never again asked her why. And Kersa never asked Inzun why she'd done any of it, at all.

During the days, Kersa tried hard not to be seen looking at Inzun too much. Inzun had noticed, after all - someone else might. And then what? Sympathising with a death-witch meant courting punishment herself. It would be bad for Inzun; bad for Kersa; and worst of all, they'd have to stop.

No. Worse than that: she'd be asked why, by someone she couldn't silence with a kiss.

~*~

When the heat wave broke and summer finally turned to autumn, Mistress Perrye rose from the teachers' table at dinner-time and walked to the front of the room.

She fixed stern eyes on Inzun. "Stand up," she said, her voice resonating with finality. "You have no place here, death-witch."

Inzun stood, even as Kersa gasped and then put a hand in front of her mouth, too late to hide her reaction. But the other students had gasped, too. Allir sat open-mouthed, a bite of her bread-roll between her teeth. Lirra only looked relieved.

"We have suffered you for a summer, so you could learn to rein yourself in," Mistress Perrye continued. Inzun's expression was unreadable even to Kersa. "Tomorrow you shall go from this place, never to return. And if you should bring destruction to others, rest assured that destruction will also come to you. By the hands of every mage, and every man and woman of the land, for none will suffer a death-witch to wreak her havoc on them unavenged. Let this be a warning to you, and to every mage who thinks to break their oath."

Inzun nodded her acknowledgment, standing straight and focused, as if the announcement had not hit her unawares at all. Had she known it was coming today? The night before, in Kersa's arms, had she already known? Or had she simply grown so good at holding herself in, no trace of surprise showed through?

Kersa stared at Inzun, for once unworried that someone might remark on it. Inzun was leaving. She'd known. She'd counted on it. How else could she excuse this, this - this whatever-it-was between her and Inzun? An oath-breaker, a death-witch. One who'd be leaving soon, so it didn't really matter if Kersa gave in to her desires. Did it?

But still, all that rung through her mind was, _I thought we'd have more time._

~*~

Kersa inched along the wall in the dark, sneaking into Inzun's room one last time. With desperate urgency she couldn't excuse, she took Inzun's face in her hands and kissed her hard, biting at her lips, trying to take her, have her, keep her, if only for a moment. Inzun returned the kiss just as fiercely at first, but then pushed her away.

"You shouldn't have come," she said, altogether too calmly. "If they catch you -"

"Shhh," Kersa said, and kissed her again. Inzun was _worried_ about her; that was sweet. "They haven't caught us this far."

Inzun, after a second's resistance, let herself be drawn in. They made love frantically, hands grasping, greedy for each other, for something that was already lost. With hands and mouths and bodies they distracted each other from what they knew. Kersa ached to let her magic reach out, to take in more of Inzun _now_ , since there would never be more again after tonight. She couldn't. Kersa held herself in by a thread, sobbing when she came apart under Inzun's hands, under Inzun's mouth, still straining for more.

Afterwards they lay together on the straw mattress, breathing hard. "Do you know where you're going?" Kersa asked hesitantly, propping herself up on an elbow.

Inzun sat up, brushing long hair away from her face. "Yes." No more than that.

"Where?" Kersa bit her lips. It was over; she knew it was over. Inzun only shrugged, and Kersa made a grimace. "You don't like answering questions, do you?"

A sharp grin. "That's why we fit. You never ask them." Inzun tilted her head to the side, gave Kersa considering look. "Never did, until now."

An unpleasant knot began to form in Kersa's stomach. She never _had_ asked, had she? After all, no telling what Inzun's answer might have been. Still, now or never -

"Why'd you break into the library?" The words came bubbling up fast, impossible to hold back. "What did you want with those secrets? Why do you never seem to care? Inzun, _why?_ " Inzun's eyes widened, but Kersa wasn't done yet. "The Mistresses - did they ask you? Do they know, or did it matter at all? This never made any sense - you never made any sense. And now you're a death-witch, and I don't think you even - why are you laughing?"

Inzun had flopped back onto the mattress, her hair a halo around her head, and she was gasping helpless laughs. "Kersa," she managed, panting for air, "Kersa, no. Of course I didn't tell them. That wouldn't have worked at all."

"Worked?" Kersa's stomach was radiating tightly-wound dread. This, _this_ was why she'd never asked.

"I don't care about Mistress Arvath's precious secrets," Inzun said, sitting up again. "I didn't break my oath over that. It was the other way round."

"What?"

"I needed to break my oath," Inzun told her, all mirth gone from her face, "and of all the ways I could think to do it, that was the most palatable."

"What?" Kersa's brain felt very slow. She'd heard the words, but they made no sense.

Inzun shrugged. "It's meant to be a punishment. So I had to do something to deserve it."

Kersa stared. Inzun was clearly not joking. "They could have killed you."

"Mistress Perrye?" Inzun waved a dismissive hand. "You've heard her go on about punishment, and death being too easy an escape. I was sure she wouldn't."

Kersa's mind wrapped herself around this, slowly. "You _wanted_ your magic to be turned." She drew back, appalled. "You ... want to be a death-witch." 

"Yes." Her head tilted. "Are you going to betray me now, Kersa?"

"You won't hold it in, will you? You'll use it." She shivered, her stomach turning. A death-witch. She should have known. Kersa pulled away further, until she was at the edge of the mattress.

"Precisely," said Inzun, with a glittering smile. 

"No," Kersa whispered. Inzun would wreak havoc, and then she'd be hunted for it. Killed. She'd deserve it, too. 

"Don't be like that," Inzun said, flicking a finger at Kersa's nose. Kersa flinched back. "You never asked why I did it. And you kept coming to me anyway."

She had, hadn't she? Except - "I still don't know," Kersa snapped. " _Why_ do you want to be a death-witch? You're still not making any sense."

Inzun grimaced. "You couldn't have made it easy, could you," she muttered.

Wait. Easy? Was that why Inzun had told her now? Because this was good-bye, and it was easier if Kersa turned from Inzun first? Was that why she'd admitted the truth?

If, in fact, it was the truth. It still made no sense.

"We've made it easy all this time," Kersa whispered. What was she doing? She should be leaving. She should be telling Mistress Perrye. She should be doing anything but this. Why was it always with Inzun that she couldn't bring herself to do what she should? "Now or never. So make it now, Inzun. Explain."

"You've always been stubborn. Fine. You want the truth? Fine." Inzun sighed, but there was a faint smile on her face. She hadn't tried all that hard to make it _easy_ , had she? Perhaps she wanted to tell someone, after all. Just this once. "I'm from Ynnermoor, you know that, right? A poor moorland farm on cursed land, near where the Mire-beasts were bound." Inzun's accent had sharpened again, all those Rs stark and prominent. 

"And?" Kersa knew the history, of course - the infamous story of the mages who'd roused the earth itself to fight in a war for some king's glory. An impressive accomplishment, if only they'd managed to undo their creation again, after the war's end. Instead, all they'd managed was to bind them into the mires of Ynnermoor, there to remain ever since. 

Inzun pressed her lips together. "I had two brothers, and a sister. When I was seven, a Mire-beast broke its chains and drowned the entire farmhouse, man, woman, child and beast, in liquid earth. I lived because I'd been sent to my mother's sister in Ynnbrook - that's the largest village thereabouts, not that you care. Some mage eventually bound the Mire-beast again, but not before it destroyed another farm."

Drowned by a Mire-beast. What a horrifying end. But what did that have to do with Inzun's broken oath? Kersa tried to find some thread between them, and failed. "I don't follow."

"When I was fourteen, a magefinder came to Ynnbrook, and found I had magical talent. I thought nothing of it then. It took me away from the moor; that was all I cared about. But once I came to Blackwood Tower and learned more, I realised. Don't you? Those mages couldn't undo their creation, but _all_ a death-witch does is undo things. A death-witch can go in there and destroy those Mire-beasts, just like that." She crossed her arms over her bare breasts, glaring. "There. Now you know."

Kersa stared at her. Inzun stared back, defiant. 

The knot of tension in Kersa's chest, the lump in her throat, the horror at Inzun's choices, at her own - all of it burst and lifted, leaving her giddy. Kersa leaned forward, curled a hand around the back of Inzun's head, and kissed her with wild relief.

"Mmm," said Inzun, pulling away. She smiled at Kersa, more hesitant than Kersa had seen her since before her Turning. "They'll hunt me for it anyway, I'm sure. I'm a death-witch, after all. And I saw them stone one, before." Stone and metal were as immune to death as they were to life. What killed a mage would kill a death-witch, too.

"You talk like you'll just let them," Kersa said, desperately. 

"Let them? No. But I've read all those accounts Mistress Arvath gave me. Death-witches don't make it long." Inzun shrugged, her eyes gleaming with fierce determination. "But I'll destroy those Mire-beasts first. No more farmhouses drowned in the ground, ever again." 

Her heart ached. Inzun hadn't reached for selfish power. She'd broken her oath for something _good_. It couldn't end like that.

"All right," Kersa said, her thoughts racing. "All right. Free-day's too short; we'd never make it. But I'm supposed to be going into the lake next moon-turn. That's our best bet - walking the bottom of the lake takes days."

Inzun blinked. "What?" 

"Just don't go far. Stay nearby until that day. Down by the hollow oak, at the road to Loweringvell? You know the one."

"Of course I do," Inzun said faintly. "What are you talking about?"

Kersa suddenly grinned. It wasn't going to be easy, no. But letting Inzun go would have been hard enough, had Inzun truly been nothing but a selfish oath-breaker. Inzun was right. She _could_ destroy those Mire-beasts. "I'm coming with you, of course." 

They'd both be hunted, for this. They'd both be oath-breakers. But they could do it, together. Inzun was right: someone should. 

Inzun stared at her for a long moment. "But -"

Kersa put her fingers on Inzun's lips. "Don't even try. Any of those death-witches you studied, did they have friends? Did their lovers fight at their side?"

Inzun's green eyes were very wide. "I never did have any luck discouraging you," she murmured, and reached out to reel Kersa in for another greedy, possessive kiss.

"Not like this, you don't," Kersa murmured against her lips. Inzun laughed, her breath huffing against Kersa's face, and she knew she'd made the right choice.

Inzun was going out to Ynnermoor to help, and no one was going to stone her for it. Inzun wasn't going to die. If anyone wanted to try, they'd have to go through Kersa first.


End file.
